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Jamestown, VA
Jamestown Settlement The first permanent English settlement in the New World; funded by the London Company (later the Virginia Company of London) -
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English Petition of Rights
Early document supporting the idea that men hav erights and establishing the concept of the rule of law. Included basic rights such as
- guarantee of trial by jury
- protection against martial law
- protection against quartering of troops
- protection of private property -
New England Confederation
In 1643, the Massachusetts Bay, Plymouth, New Haven, and Connecticut settlements formed a "league of friendship" for defense against the Native American tribes. -
English Bill of Rights
To prevent abuse of power by the king and all future British monarchs, Parliament drew up a list of provisions called the English Bill of Rights. The provisions allowed for
- no standing army in peacetime
- free elections
- right of petition
- parliamentary checks on monarch's power -
The Albany Plan of Union
A plan proposed by Benjamin Franklin that supported the creation of an annual congress of delegates from each of the 13 colonies. The body would have the power to raise military and naval forces, make war and peace with the Native Americans, regulate trade with them, tax, and collect customs duties. (It was agreed upon by the representatives attending the meeting, but turned down by the colonies and by the Crown.) -
Stamp Act Congress
The Stamp Act was passed by Congress in early 1765 requiring the use of tax stamps on all legal documents, on certain business agreements, and on newspapers. In October, nine colonies (all except Georgia, New Hampshire, North Carolina, and Virginia) sent delegates to the Stamp Act Congress in NY. There they prepared a Declaration of Rights and Grievances against the new British policies and sent it to the king. -
The Boston Massacre
The Boston Massacre The Boston Massacre was the killing of five colonists by British regulars on March 5, 1770. It was the culmination of tensions in the American colonies that had been growing since Royal troops first appeared in Massachusetts in October 1768 to enforce the heavy tax burden imposed by the Townshend Acts. -
Boston Tea Party
Boston Tea Party Disguised men and others then went on board the tea-ships moored at Griffin's Wharf, and in the course of three hours they emptied three hundred and forty-two chests of tea into the water of the harbor. -
First Continental Congress
In response to the Intolerable Acts, delegates from every colony (except Georgia) met in Philadelphia to discuss the worsening situation and debate plans of action. The sent a Declaration of Rights to King George III. The delegates also urged all colonies to refuse trade with England until the taxes and trade regulations were repealed. -
Battle at Lexington and Concord
The Battles of Lexington and Concord were the first military engagements of the American Revolutionary War. They were fought on April 19, 1775, in Middlesex County, Province of Massachusetts Bay, within the towns of Lexington, Concord, Lincoln, Menotomy (present-day Arlington), and Cambridge, near Boston. The battles marked the outbreak of open armed conflict between the Kingdom of Great Britain and its thirteen colonies in the mainland of British North America. -
Second Continental Congress
Most of the delegates who attended the First Continental Congress attended the Second Continental Congress in 1775. The Congress became the nation's first national government - from the adoption of the Declaration of Independence (1776) until the Articles of Confederation (1781). -
Declaration of Independence
Congress named a committe of five - Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Roger Sherman, Robert Livingston, and Thomas Jefferson - to prepare a proclamation of independence. No political system had ever been founded on the notion that the people should rule instead of being ruled, nor on the idea that ever person is important as an individual (created equal). -
Articles of Confederation
The Articles of Confederation set up a government that unified independent states into an alliance. The Articles established no executive or judicial branch. Each state had only one vote in Congress, regardless of population or wealth. -
Philadelphia Convention (Constitutional Convention)
Constitutional ConventionThe Convention was organized to address problems in governing the United States of America, which had been operating under the Articles of Confederation following independence from Great Britain. Although the Convention was purportedly intended only to revise the Articles of Confederation, the intention from the outset of many of its proponents, chief among them James Madison and Alexander Hamilton, was to create a new government rather than fix the existing one. -
The Constitution
Ratification of the Constitution required nine of the thirteen states to agree on the document that would establish a new government of the United States. The Constitution consists of a preamble, seven articles, twenty-seven amendments, and a paragraph certifying its enactment by the constitutional convention.
